Looking for the meta (2026 edition) [v5]

Posting this here because the relevant subreddit has gotten too noisy lately. Looking for honest feedback, not validation. Mostly thinking out loud — feel free to push back hard.

Long-time lurker, first-time poster. This came up at a meetup recently and the room was split, so curious what the broader community thinks.

Long-time lurker, first-time poster. The trade-offs here are not obvious to me and I keep flip-flopping.